Russia is no Syria, no Iraq, no Afghanistan. It is a nuclear power. Let me say that again, it is a nuclear power. It has missiles, it has bombs, and if further provoked they may use them. Nuclear weapons are not something you ignore and pretend they will not use.

Why now is Putin attempting to pull together the Great Eastern Europe and Central Asia Prosperity Zone? Since he took power he as been waiting. He has been playing a long game. Remember it was Churchill who said, “Russia is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.”[1] He has pretended the very modern 21st Century leader, but in fact is nothing more than another Russian who wants to be Czar.

Putin has led the NATO nations to conclude that he is not a threat. In order to balance the books, most of the Western NATO nations have reduced the size of their armed forces in the name of fiscal austerity. The United States has reduced our forward based footprint in Germany to the 2nd Cavalry Regiment (Stryker) and some support troops, with an Airborne Brigade in Italy. For twelve years our troops in Germany, the United States and even a Brigade from Korea have rotated in an out of either Iraq or Afghanistan. Putin knows we are tired, he knows our troops are tired. He senses the growing isolationism of the American public. Moreover he believes he can bleed the US dry economically.

And he sense, what I have concluded, that the Obama, Rice, and Kerry foreign policy team are ineffectual. The adults of the first administration Clinton, and Gates are gone. The loss of Gates is particularly profound in that he was a Russian expert. In his recent book he described as seeing in Putin a stone cold killer.

An invasion into the Eastern Ukraine directly threatens NATO members Poland, Slovenia, Romania and the Baltic States. Putin is gambling that the NATO and US will not respond until after he takes the Eastern Ukraine. But the question that should concern the NATO and the US will he stop here?

How can we stop him if decides that Poland, Romania, and the Baltic States pine for a return to the umbrella of the Great Eastern Europe and Central Asia Prosperity Zone?

12 January 2014

As some of you may know I am fascinated by the history of World War I. I have been since my first semester in graduate school, when I took a seminar entitled, “Europe in the Age of World War I.” This course taught by the formidable professor of European history at James Madison University, Dr. Catherine Boyd sought to guide us to understand why the European powers stumbled, bumbled, and fumbled their way war; and why despite all evidence to contrary continued to fight a war of attrition. Like historians before and since there was no easy answer.

26 December 2013

In South Sudan, we are once again witnessing the United States misplaced emphasis on American styled democracy.

South Sudan is a Christian country; but it is a Christian country that is defined by tribes. We in the West do not understand the pull of tribal allegiance. We Americans may revel at our: Irish, German, Scottish, English or other heritage. We may have self-identified pseudo-tribes; be it member of that church, that club, that organization, graduate of that school, or however we wish to define ourselves. But we do not understand the pull of tribal culture. We do not understand that loyalty to a tribe has greater pull than the notion of representative self-government, particularly when your tribe is not the number one.

Ms. Rice seems to be very upset and threatening to stamp her foot is disgust, despite the fact that she is largely responsible for the political settlement that created the South Sudan. Ms. Powers of course will want the United States to intervene, she is a useful idiot who idealism clouds common sense.

Oh for the days of realists, Henry Kissinger, George Schultz, Brent Scowcroft, Zbigniew Brzezinski, James Baker, Sam Nunn, James Baker, and Jeanne Kilpatrick. Men and women who look at the world as it is not as they wanted it; men and women who sought reasonable solutions that worked, not what was taught in graduate seminars in some Ivy League college or university.

16 September 2013

Over at the American Conservative, Gian Gentile offers some good advice to our policy makers, listen to the Chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff.

"Dempsey ran afoul of Cohen apparently because he has urged caution in the rush to war against the Damascus regime of Bashar al-Assad. The general announced that while the application of U.S. power might tip the balance in the ongoing civil war pitting Assad against a wide range of insurgent groups, it likely would fail to resolve or mitigate “the underlying and historic ethnic, religious and tribal issues that are fueling this conflict.”" HF

21 June 2013

This book
is about conservatism in its best sense; the political philosophy, espoused by
Edmund Burke that seeks to preserve the best of the social order but one which
acknowledges the need to make prudent changes over time as conditions change.

A
conservatism that recognizes the liberties of the individual, but which argues
that those liberties come with obligations of the individual to society. A conservatism that believes in free trade
but acknowledges that the government has a responsibility to ensure that
corporations conduct themselves in a way that does not threatens the social
order, but which regulates commerce only as required. A conservatism that acknowledged partisan
differences and argued parties and factions must work together to achieve
consensus for the greater good of the nation and not for the glorification of
individual members or groups within parties and factions.

24 May 2013

The
wife of a friend with whom I served in the Army and who shall retire this summer and whose son was killed in Afghanistan, wrote this on her Face
Book page, we should all pause and remember those who have given their all for
us and our nation.

Over the past several days everywhere I have been someone
has wished upon me to have a great holiday weekend. I too used to be guilty
thinking that this weekend was about the end of the school year and the
welcoming of summer. It has taken your absence and sacrifice to help me to
understand that his weekend is not about sales at stores, picnics or pools. We
will celebrate your life this weekend and honor you and all that have made the
ultimate sacrifice. You are missed beyond words. I love you always.

Let
us reflect on these words from the Book
of Common Prayer:

ALMIGHTY God, our heavenly Father, in whose
hands are the living and the dead; We give thee thanks for all those thy
servants who have laid down their lives in the service of our country. Grant to
them thy mercy and the light of thy presence, that the good work which thou
hast begun in them may be perfected; through Jesus Christ thy Son our Lord.
Ame

22 April 2013

Almost a weeks ago, before the nation was glued to the
television sets with all things the Boston manhunt, we watched as the United States Senate, voted not to allow closure on debate effectively
killing the Manchin-Toomey amendment.

Their weapons were the rhetoric of freedom, their weapons
were the power of economics, and their weapons were the arsenals of their
military. In their endeavor to bring an
end to the Soviet empire they were joined spiritually by Pope John Paul II. This son of Poland, the Bishop of Rome,
answered once and for all the question of Joseph Stalin, “how many divisions
does the Pope have?” None, but the mere
threat of returning to Poland to die with his countryman was enough to cause
the Bear to blink.

I did not agree with the politics of Reagan and Thatcher,
but one must concede they were effective.
Each was effective domestic leader, Thatcher was the more ideologically conservative
hardliner in her economic policy—but that was result of the British Parliamentary
System; whereas Reagan regularly had to compromise to achieve what he wanted—a result
of the American Constitutional system.
Each altered the discussion during their tenure—making it possible for centrists’
democrats like Bill Clinton and Barrack Obama to be elected President; and for
Tony Blair to find a Third Way.

I never thought I would write this but our nation is better
off for having Ronald Reagan as President[1]; and the world is better
off because Reagan and Thatcher stuck to their message and brought an end to
the Soviet Empire and discredited once and for all communists’ ideology.

[1] I voted for Jimmy Carter in 1980 and Walter
Mondale in 1984. I thought then that
Ronald Reagan was just an actor portraying a President, I now realize I was
wrong, oh so very wrong.

24 March 2013

There was a very interesting recent discussion regarding
Northern Africa and the battle against Islamic Terrorists.

Early on in the Global War on Terrorism I was chosen to lead
a Multi-national planning effort to develop a long-term campaign against
Islamic Terrorism in a Maghreb.
Based on assessments it was believed
that the greatest threats came in Southern Algeria from the GSPC. The planning team was comprised of military
planners from the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, France, Spain,
Italy, Germany, and Turkey. What was
evident early on was that United States knowledge of the region was woefully
lacking. In particular the French,
Spanish, and Italian officers providing great insights into what was really
happening in this region.

The first and most important conclusion was like much of the
world the national boundaries draw by the West meant little or nothing to the
inhabitants of these regions. Second
large swaths can and should be considered ungoverned. Ungoverned areas mean just what you would
assume it means—an area where the government does not or is unable to exert
control. Third the nature the activities
in the ungoverned area included criminal activity, tribal and ethnic conflict
(particularly the conflict between Arab North African and Black Africans),
Islamic terrorism, and anti-governments rebels.

How did we, as a society, lose the
ability to formulate questions about the feasibility of a political
alternative? How did it happen that a person who suggests a nonviolent solution
is the delusional one, the traitor, and the one who calls for the leveling of
Gaza is the true patriot? How did peace become the enemy of the people, and war
always the preferred option? How did it happen that dialogue and treaties cause
more public fear than a volley of missiles? And how did these dehumanizing
processes seal us off from the suffering of others? How did we lose the
capacity for empathy? What does it mean that a girl from Gaza—whose school was
bombed and her best friend was killed before her eyes—has to remind us that
they, too, are human beings? And how has a nation that has occupied other
people’s territory for forty-five years continued to tell itself, with such
deep conviction, that we are the single and ultimate victim in this story? And
the evil of the occupation has become so banal that no one sees the evil
anymore.

Does this reflect a dominant view? No but it does reflect the divide that exist
within Israel. The political divisions
within Israel are along secular and sectarian lines as well as where they
immigrated from to Israel.

17 October 2012

Mother Jones is not a magazine known for highlighting the good works of institutions such as VMI. More often than such institutions would be in Mother Jones "progressive/liberal/populists" crosshairs. That is not the case in a recent article regarding the Romney speech at VMI. As COL Lang has suggested in earlier post VMI would be a good host but would do nothing to give an appearance of support for a particular presidential candidate.

I have no doubt that the VMI graduate who organized the appearance, believed that it was right and proper. I know him, he is a fine young man, but like many of us in our youth, he allowed his exhubrance to get in the way of common sense.

There is a good reason for the military to remain impartial--regardless of who is elected, that person will be the Commander in Chief as specfied by the Constitution of the United States. The military's alligence is to the Constitution, not a particular political candidate. Unfortunately this message and responsibility is often lost on some who serve in the military; or some who use their retired rank to indicate support for a particular candidate. Neutrality is the best course; to be partisan will ultimately erode the special trust and bond between those serving in uniform and the American public. Foresman

15 September 2012

The events of the last couple of days are a stark reminder
that you reap what you sow. The United
States is now paying the supreme price for our arrogance in dealing with the
Islamic people of the Near East (I use the old term for a reason) has resulted
in neither stability nor democracy. We
do not understand the Arab world; we do not understand Islam. Somehow we have convinced ourselves that
Arabs are no different than us—rational by western standards, influenced by the
Judeo-Christian ethic and a believer in the concept of the state ascending over
tribalism. They are rational, but by the
standards of their culture, history, and religion. They are not western. They are tribal. Religion is the central part of their
life. The concept of and loyalty to a
nation state is accepted in the abstract but does not transcend their tribe or
family. But they are rational
actors. They do not like
foreigners. They accept the tenets of
their religion with fervor of belief.

23 August 2012

"...as a candidate courting his party’s conservative base, Romney has issued foreign-policy pronouncements with a harder line. He says his administration would align closely with Israel, view Russia as the United States’ primary geostrategic foe and label China as a currency manipulator. The population of terrorist suspects at the Guantánamo Bay military prison might double, and “enhanced interrogation techniques” such as waterboarding could return to the counterterrorism toolbox. A Romney administration purportedly would increase defense spending and bolster rather than shrink the size of the U.S. military. There would be no diplomacy with Iran, which would be enjoined to abandon its nuclear-weapons ambitions or else. U.S. military forces would remain in Afghanistan until the Taliban is defeated decisively." Kifield

-----------------------

While the focus is Mitt Romeny's foreign policy position, this article from the National Interest provides a very good overview of the varied and competing schools of American Foreign policy. Foresman

05 August 2012

Over at the Washington Post, Henry Kissinger provides some insight into democratic transitions in the Middle East. Regardless of your opinions Kissinger the man; his insights should be carefully considered. HJFJR

"The United States can and should assist on the long journey toward societies based on civil tolerance and individual rights. But it cannot do so effectively by casting every conflict entirely in ideological terms. Our efforts must also be placed within a framework of U.S. strategic interests, which should help define the extent and nature of our role. Progress toward a world order embracing participatory governance and international cooperation requires the fortitude to work through intermediate stages. It also requires that the various aspirants to a new order in the Middle East recognize that our contribution to their efforts will be measured by their compatibility with our interests and values. For this, the realism and idealism we now treat as incompatible need to be reconciled."

02 August 2012

I learned reading the Telegraph this evening that Sir John Keegan has died. His Face of Battle is a brilliant book. In recent years I enjoyed his book on Intelligence and reading his pieces in the Telegraph when he was their Defence Correspondent. Foresman

29 July 2012

One of my faults is I am a thinker; that I often question the status quo, the why things are. One of my favorite web sites to visit is Tom Dispatch. Many in the military would not read Tom Dispatch as it routinely questions the very underpinnings of how things are done in the United States in particular in the National Security arena.

Several weeks ago, Tom Dispatch published an extended article on the shadow war in Africa. In part it questioned why the United States military has divided the world into six fiefdoms or Combatant Commands. This week there is an extended debate between a spokesman; for United States Africa Command and Tom Dispatch. I commend the original and the letter to editor and the response to the letter to the editor, as they are enlightening.

20 July 2012

In recent week the Commonwealth of Virginia has been transfixed by the very public, very raucous, and very un-Virginia like events surrounding the firing and then rehiring of the President of the University of Virginia.

Among the criticism leveled at the Rector and Board of Visitors of the University of Virginia was a belief that the board, overwhelming composed of corporate types and influenced by the thinking of the Darden School, viewed the University as a business and not an educational institution.

30 June 2012

Over at Slate.com they have just concluded their annual "Breakfast Table" discussion on the 2011 Term of the Suprme Court of the United States (I know I could write SCOTUS, just as I can write POTUS, FLOTUS but choose not to as I find the abbreviations trivalize and cheapen those persons or institutions). This years participants were Judge Richard A. Posner, Emily Bazelon, Walter Dellinger, and Dahlia Lithwick. Posner is perhaps the smartest man on the Federal Bench, the leader of the law and economics school he is astute and most importantly writes his decisions in plain english; he is an iconoclast. Walter Dellinger is a former Solicitor General in the Clinton Administration. Ms. Bazelon and Ms. Lithwick are both regular legal commentators on Slate and other publications.

21 June 2012

I wrote this back in 2008, I never published it, but it was my analysis of why President Obama Health Care plan was not going to pass, boy did I get that wrong, and why there was so much opposition to it, that is what I do believe I got right. So rather than changing what I wrote to fit today, instead I have highlighted in Red those parts where I clearly blew it; the rest I believe provides not only insight to the health care debate but the whole discussion between large and small government.

I have been thinking much recently about President Obama Healthcare plan and why it is going to fail. Like Hillary Clinton attempt in the 1990s, Obama’s will never see the light of day. Unlike Clinton’s plan, Obama’s was not killed by the Insurance Companies, the AMA, Big Pharmacy, but rather by the revolt of the people against the plan. A revolt seized on by the Republican as a means of blunting the gains of the Democrats in the 2008 election. The Republicans rediscovered their MoJo and learned that minority power comes from saying no.

04 June 2012

Neither the United States nor the United Kingdom understands their history!

Given the shock of both liberals (e.g. Tony Blair) and neo-conservatives (e.g. William Kristol) to the events unfolding in Egypt, Libya, Iraq, they should take pause in urging the United States to involve itself in the affairs of Syria.

In the United States Government there are those who think intervening to end the violence is Syria is the right and proper course. Of course most have never served in uniform.

Most can speak about the absolutes of counter insurgency having never had to make it work. Most believed that democracy would spring forth confluence of Tigris and Euphrates if we liberated Iraq; likewise they believe is Assad is overthrow suddenly Syria will become the beacon of democracy in the Middle East.

Their naïvete about Syria is surpassed only by their naivete about Iraq.

25 May 2012

While not officially Memorial Day my wife and I attended a funeral today in Arlington Cemetery; the funeral was near the Amphitheater and the Tomb of the Unknown, after the funeral my wife and I took a few minutes to walk up the hill to the Amphitheater. Sir Moses Ezekiel VMI Class of 1866 designed the Amphitheater. He is buried near by in Section 16 of Arlington, as he was a veteran of the Civil War having fought with Battalion of Cadets at the Battle of New Market on May 15, 1865. Having never visited his burial site which is at the base of the Confederate Monument I thought it was appropriate.

In Virginia Confederate Memorial Day is celebrated on the same day as the national holiday. According to Wikipedia, Memorial Day began as a celebration of those who had died during the Civil War. Over time it has come to be a celebration of those who died in all wars.

It was fitting we visited Sir Moses Ezekiel grave. Not only did he design the Amphitheater, but he also sculpted the Confederate War Memorial, and of course Virginia Morning Her Dead on the grounds of his Alma Mater the Virginia Military Institute.

21 May 2012

Carter Glass was a conservative, in the Burkean and Madisonian sense; Henry Steagall was a southern rural Democrat; and like many from the South his politics was populists in that he wished to protect the common man from the power of corporations, banks, and railroads. Together they help enact one of the most important Banking laws of the 20th Century the Glass-Steagall Act. While there were a number of provisions in the Glass-Steagall Act its most important functions were, as stated in Wikipedia:

The Banking Act of 1933 (Pub.L. 73-66, 48 Stat. 162, enacted June 16, 1933) was a law that established the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) in the United States and imposed banking reforms, several of which were intended to control speculation. Specifically It was intended to erect a barrier between the activities of commercial banks and investment banks.

Carter Glass born in 1860, his early years were shaped by the cycles of boom and bust in reconstruction South. Booms and bust cycles that tore families’ asunder, booms and bust that left scars on countless communities across the South, to include his hometown, Lynchburg Virginia. As a result of his own experience and his observations Glass believe there was a proper role for government in controlling the excess of capitalism.

04 April 2012

One aspect of counterinsurgency doctrine which is not often talked about is trust.

In the United States Army seminal doctrinal manual FM 3-24 Counterinsurgency (December 2006) in paragraph 5.84, establishing trust is the key to successful combined action.

Combined action unit members must develop and build positive relationships with their associated HN security forces and with the town leadership. By living among the people, combined action units serve an important purpose. They demonstrate the commitment and competence of counterinsurgents while sharing experiences and relationships with local people. These working relationships build trust and enhance the HN government’s legitimacy. To build trust further, U.S. members should ask HN security forces for training on local customs, key terrain, possible insurgent hideouts, and relevant cultural dynamics. HN forces should also be asked to describe recent local events.[1]

The whole notion of fighting “wars amongst the people”[2] requires that those conducting counterinsurgency operations establish trust with the people they seek to protect and whose hearts and minds they wish to win. Trust that cannot be won overnight, which cannot be bequeathed to the individual or the unit that follows, trust which allows those we seek to protect to identify with us as humans.

The picture at the beginning, was taken from Army Knowledge On Line. It shows a soldier, inside a building providing humanitarian assistance items to an Afghan woman. Good you say that what we should be doing. Look closely at the picture what do you see. You see a man in full battle kit. In fact in many respect he reminds me a Stormtrooper[3] from Star Wars (picture on the below).[4]

It is my observation that the United States military has become so fixated on force protection and uniformity of appearance they have lost sight that the appearance of a man or women interacting with indigenous locals in full battle rattle does not convey a message of trust. We are more likely seen through the eyes of the locals at the Stormtrooper and not the benevolent benefactor that we picture ourselves as being.

This is not to say we should not be concerned about force protection, and given the number of shootings of Americans in recent months by members of the Afghanistan military and police, we must remain vigilant. However in situations where we control the environment and how the locals interact with our forces it would seem that by putting a human face on our interaction it would go a little ways towards establishing trust. Ditch the helmet, ditch the ballistic eye wear, ditch the ballistic armor vest, keep your weapon and kit close at hand, and present a human face.

[2] For a full discussion of what is meant by the term “wars amongst the people” see The Utility of Force: The Art of War in the Modern World by General Sir Rupert Smith KCB (Knight Commander of the Bath), DSO& Bar (Distinguish Service Order with bar equivalent to our Oak Leaf), OBE (Order of the British Empire), QGM (Queens Gallantry Medal).

18 March 2012

There is going to be much finger pointing about whom to blame for losing Afghanistan.

The Republicans will point to the Democrats and say that because they were weak on defense, and that they were not sufficiently committed, that the Democrats lost Afghanistan.

The Democrats will point to the Republicans, and with all the sincerity they can muster, will say if you had not led us to a useless war in Iraq then we would have won in Afghanistan; it was your Republican President who made it the forgotten war.

Our Allies will point to our nation and say that it was you who got us to join you in this endeavor, it was you, the arrogant United States who led us down the primrose path; it was you America, the evil superpower, who lost Afghanistan.

The American military will say that we were stabbed in the back. It was the weak kneed politicians who sold us down the river. If we had just stayed a little longer, if we had just had some gee whiz weapons, if we had more money, more soldiers, more of everything we would have won. It was the socialists and the liberals, and the non-believing secular humanists that sold us down the river and caused us to lose Afghanistan.

The American people will little notice that we lost, for they were never at war. They went to the mall. They played their little league games. They put on false patriotism when they thanked a soldier, thankful it was he or she and not their precious son or daughter who went to Afghanistan.

There will be a group of Americans who do not blame, who grieve for their loved ones who now lie in eternal rest with their comrades, guarded by white marble Crosses, Stars of David, and the Islamic Crescent.

Another group of Americans, men and women who went forward voluntarily to do their nation’s bidding and whose bodies and minds are broken by the war in a far away and strange lands who know, like all the veterans of that conflict that it was not the dead, or the broken, or those who went to a far away land who lost Afghanistan. It was all those who seek to blame someone else rather than looking in the mirror, who lost Afghanistan.

And in Afghanistan they will rejoice that they expelled the infidel Americans, as they expelled the infidel Russians and British and any other foreigner who dared invade their country and dared to try to bring them into the current century. The Afghnas will go back to their warrior ways, to their tribes, to their revenge killings, to the brutality of a country mired in ways and mores at odds with our western concepts of modernity.

COL (R) Henry “Hank” Foresman, Jr. retired from the United States Army after thirty-three years of service. He is now employed as a Department of the Army Civilian, the views express are his and do not reflect the views of the Department of Defense or the Department of the Army.

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The photograph is of George C. Marshall in China. He was sent there by Truman to seek a peace. Marshall was blamed by McCarthy for Mao's victory. pl

12 March 2012

As the discussion of a possible Israeli attack on Iran swirls around Washington, I have to wonder whether either the Israeli government or the government of the United States has considered that an attack on Iran would be considered an Act of War under International Law.

While I believe it is clearly part of the calculus for the United States Government, I have to wonder if the Israeli government is so arrogant that they believe they will get a “hall pass” from the civilized world.

We Americans tend to be fairly isolated from the opinions of foreign governments, and we have come to accept the actions of Israel as being right and proper because our government and many of our institutions have said that it is the way it should be. There was a time when European governments felt the same way; however over the last twenty years or so, European governments of all stripes have come to question the legitimacy of many of Israel’s actions vis a vie the Palestinians.

While Israel can rightly expect a United States veto of any draconian resolution in the United Nations Security Council; the United States cannot protect Israel from the actions of individual countries or more importantly the World Court. I have no doubt that the leaders of Israel, to include Shimon Peres, the last true Israeli statesman, will be indicted by the World Court if they launch an unprovoked attack against Iran. They will also find that Israel is isolated and shunned by the civilized nations of the world, except of course the United States.

Unfortunately I doubt that Bibi and the leaders of the radical right in Israel have given any serious thought to the second and third order effects of an attack on Iran.

Hank Foresman

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This is the first post published here by Colonel (Ret.) Henry Foresman. We look forward to many more. pl